I thought to send this under the thread of "Why is a lung for mantra necessary" to give a 2 cent answer to Michal's excellent questions but then realized his questions are addressing a more basic issue.These are very good questions that need be addressed. There are many other comments on this, all of which are very excellent and completely correct. But as it is in the nature of human beings to add their own 2 cents, here are mine. It is suggested that you read through it once before jumping to the web links.

Into the lions mouth!

Michal wrote:Hi,Chögyal Namkhai Norbu always says quite categorically that to produce the function of the mantra, you need to have received its [i]lung, otherwise it does not work.But there are a lot of teachers like AFAIK Lama Zopa Rinpoche or Tsem Tulku Rinpoche who just publish a lot of even quite high mantras (like protectors and so on) even on the internet just as you can normally use them without any empowerment.

If someone is your Spiritual Teacher then it is very much to your benefit to completely accept whatever they tell you, or do, without the smallest doubt or mistrust, even if it varies from time to time, or runs into direct conflict with conventional norms, usages, logic or common sense. Then the blessings will flow and you can get the inner benefit of the teachings. Call it a willing suspension of disbelief, if you want. Part of you can know that what the Teacher is saying may not be true, or what they are doing may not be good (crazy wisdom), but you let that go in order to achieve the greater truth or greater good of obtaining blessings. Perhaps the bigger the suspension of disbelief, the bigger the blessings of going beyond ordinary mind. If the Teacher is wise, then he/she works with the circumstance of each student. Then the student is not pushed outside their acceptance zone and does not run away.

This is very much like the concept of having complete freedom to act on impulse in Rushen, while keeping a part of your judgment in reserve so you don't hurt yourself or anyone else. If you forget this in Rushen you can really harm yourself or others: sounds heavy and it is. With a good guide it is safe.

The key point is that, by allowing yourself to hold diametrically opposed ideas about statements or behavior of the Teacher, without a need to resolve the resulting cognitive dissonance, you grow beyond your conceptual limits. The benefit is that you are more tolerant and less reactive to whatever occurs in your continuum. Your equanimity is increased.

So I really don´t know what to think of it. Are these teachers just wrong ?

No they are not wrong thinking. What is right view for one student in one circumstance, or lineage, may not be right, or true, for the same student in another circumstance, or lineage, or for other students in the same or other circumstances, or lineages. What ever turns the Wheel, is OK.

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche once said, "(...) The sun and the moon are reflected in clear, still water instantly. Similarly, the blessings of all the Buddhas are always present for those who have complete confidence in them. (...)" -

What the great Dzogchen Master HH Dilgo Khentse Rinpoche (may He always remain over my head) is saying here, is that if you have complete confidence [faith beyond any cognitive dissonance] in the Buddhas, then whatever occurs in your continuum will have the blessings of the Buddhas. In his analogy about the sun, moon, and water he is pointing out that these blessings occur instantaneously [are co-emergent] with the complete confidence. "Always present" means that these blessings are independent of cause, or lack of cause. You do not have to do anything to get these blessings. The sun and moon have many rich meanings in Tibetan Buddhism, which you can see here on Page 80 of:

What more then the blessings of all the buddhas could one ever need to produce the function of a mantra??Yup - or the blessed function of ANYTHING that occurs in your continuum when you have the blessing of all of the Buddhas, or the blessings of your teacher as the essence of all of the Buddhas![/i]For me, at least Sanskrit mantras are kind of vibrations connected to some archetypes of Western culture whose language came up from Sanskrit (sorry for Jungian, not "Buddhist" terminology). So I think, at least if I recite it in the condotion of buddha-nature, i.e. connected to the Dharmakaya quality, in a non-dual vision or however I call it, it should work just as sound has power to affect matter (watch for example http://youtu.be/Uu6Ox5LrhJg).

Yup - but the devil is in the details: are you really in the condition of Buddha-nature?

But I really may be quite wrong, I don´t know.You are doing fine - keep the questions coming - just need to work things through a bit. There is a light at the end of the tunnel of base luminosity – your natural state.

Also, I for one even have i little bit problem with how Chögyal Namkhai Norbu gives lungs via internet: He reads something very quickly, often not possible to understand, then it is converted to 0&1 (i.e. bits) and then your home-computer converts it back to sound. So the sound, its analogue-quality is completely lost on the way. How could it work, then?

Good question - and the answer is non-logical faith: complete confidence in his Buddha blessing - whatever he does, or doesn't do. To see the Teacher, as the essence of all of the Buddhas is one of the 5 certainties, that you need to have when you take Teachings to make them work.

It sometimes may also be helpful to keep in mind the phrase “my mother drunk or sober.”

Also, sometimes, when I am listening to the DC-webcast and the lungs on its last day, in fact I am not even in the state of Guruyoga, so really very far from an experience of the deity concerned. Could it work then, that I receive it?

Of course you receive it - if you believe that you do. Again, faith, complete confidence in the Teacher, as the essence of all Buddhas, is what allows it to work. Being awake helps - have some coffee or gently pinch yourself. Sometimes I strongly rub the top of my head and this helps me stay awake.

And also I would like to ask, there are some mantras or dharanis in Sutric Buddhism like GATE-mantra and so on. Maybe, as they belong to Sutra and not Tantra, one does not need lung for these mantras?

My 2 cents is that if you say any mantra - even without a lung - it is better than common distracted speech. You can also test a mantra to see if it works. Do an accumulation of a mantra without lung and then do an accumulation of the same mantra having received the lung for that mantra. I think you will find that with a lung (perhaps because you will have more faith and confidence), it works better.

One of my root Teachers, the Venerable Deshung Rinpoche said mantras 24/7.

A practitioner of the great yidam Vajrakilaya was practicing on an island in a lake, and because of the power of his practice, the people on shore saw 5 colored lights coming from his simple hut, and he became a little famous. Then one day a high Lama, with his retinue, was passing by on the shore of that lake and decided that he should go and pay respects to the mantra Lama on the island. So they hired a boat and went out to the I sland. After exchanging pleasantries, the high Lama practiced a little with the mantra lama. Then the high Lama stopped the practice and said to the mantra Lama, "But you are saying it completely wrong, it is not chilli chilli ya but killi kila ya." They finished the practice and the high Lama and his retinue went back on their boats to go to the shore. But just as they got to the shore they turned and saw the mantra Lama walking over the water to them. The mantra lama was very respectful to the high Lama and said, "Excuse me Master, I am getting old, but was it kalli kila ya or killi kila ya?

So maybe everything does depend on faith - full confidence in the Buddhas.

So for me, if there is no conflict with whatever my Teacher, says or does, I get the blessings. Hmnnn? Maybe I can walk on water? Better to try from the shallows.

Hope this helps,

Long life to the Dzogchen Masters, with good health and with success in all things.

I thought to send this under the thread of "Why is a lung for mantra necessary" to give a 2 cent answer to Michal's excellent questions but then realized his questions are addressing a more basic issue.These are very good questions that need be addressed. There are many other comments on this, all of which are very excellent and completely correct. But as it is in the nature of human beings to add their own 2 cents, here are mine. It is suggested that you read through it once before jumping to the web links.I am sending this a second time using blue type to parse the comments. My apologies to those who don’t like blue (ish). (That’s funny you don’t look bluish.)

Into the lions mouth!

Michal wrote:Hi,Chögyal Namkhai Norbu always says quite categorically that to produce the function of the mantra, you need to have received its [i]lung, otherwise it does not work.But there are a lot of teachers like AFAIK Lama Zopa Rinpoche or Tsem Tulku Rinpoche who just publish a lot of even quite high mantras (like protectors and so on) even on the internet just as you can normally use them without any empowerment.

If someone is your Spiritual Teacher then it is very much to your benefit to completely accept whatever they tell you, or do, without the smallest doubt or mistrust, even if it varies from time to time, or runs into direct conflict with conventional norms, usages, logic or common sense. Then the blessings will flow and you can get the inner benefit of the teachings. Call it a willing suspension of disbelief, if you want. Part of you can know that what the Teacher is saying may not be true, or what they are doing may not be good (crazy wisdom), but you let that go in order to achieve the greater truth or greater good of obtaining blessings. Perhaps the bigger the suspension of disbelief, the bigger the blessings of going beyond ordinary mind. If the Teacher is wise, then he/she works with the circumstance of each student. Then the student is not pushed outside their acceptance zone and does not run away.

This is very much like the concept of having complete freedom to act on impulse in Rushen, while keeping a part of your judgment in reserve so you don't hurt yourself or anyone else. If you forget this in Rushen you can really harm yourself or others: sounds heavy and it is. With a good guide it is safe.

The key point is that, by allowing yourself to hold diametrically opposed ideas about statements or behavior of the Teacher, without a need to resolve the resulting cognitive dissonance, you grow beyond your conceptual limits. The benefit is that you are more tolerant and less reactive to whatever occurs in your continuum. Your equanimity is increased.

So I really don´t know what to think of it. Are these teachers just wrong ?

No they are not wrong thinking. What is right view for one student in one circumstance, or lineage, may not be right, or true, for the same student in another circumstance, or lineage, or for other students in the same or other circumstances, or lineages. What ever turns the Wheel, is OK.

Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche once said, "(...) The sun and the moon are reflected in clear, still water instantly. Similarly, the blessings of all the Buddhas are always present for those who have complete confidence in them. (...)" -

What the great Dzogchen Master HH Dilgo Khentse Rinpoche (may He always remain over my head) is saying here, is that if you have complete confidence [faith beyond any cognitive dissonance] in the Buddhas, then whatever occurs in your continuum will have the blessings of the Buddhas. In his analogy about the sun, moon, and water he is pointing out that these blessings occur instantaneously [are co-emergent] with the complete confidence. "Always present" means that these blessings are independent of cause, or lack of cause. You do not have to do anything to get these blessings. The sun and moon have many rich meanings in Tibetan Buddhism, which you can see here on Page 80 of:

Yup - or the blessed function of ANYTHING that occurs in your continuum when you have the blessing of all of the Buddhas, or the blessings of your teacher as the essence of all of the Buddhas!For me, at least Sanskrit mantras are kind of vibrations connected to some archetypes of Western culture whose language came up from Sanskrit (sorry for Jungian, not "Buddhist" terminology). So I think, at least if I recite it in the condotion of buddha-nature, i.e. connected to the Dharmakaya quality, in a non-dual vision or however I call it, it should work just as sound has power to affect matter (watch for example http://youtu.be/Uu6Ox5LrhJg).

Yup - but the devil is in the details: are you really in the condition of Buddha-nature?But I really may be quite wrong, I don´t know.

You are doing fine - keep the questions coming - just need to work things through a bit. There is a light at the end of the tunnel of base luminosity – your natural state.Also, I for one even have i little bit problem with how Chögyal Namkhai Norbu gives lungs via internet: He reads something very quickly, often not possible to understand, then it is converted to 0&1 (i.e. bits) and then your home-computer converts it back to sound. So the sound, its analogue-quality is completely lost on the way. How could it work, then?

Good question - and the answer is non-logical faith: complete confidence in his Buddha blessing - whatever he does, or doesn't do. To see the Teacher, as the essence of all of the Buddhas is one of the 5 certainties, that you need to have when you take Teachings to make them work.

It sometimes may also be helpful to keep in mind the phrase “my mother drunk or sober.”Also, sometimes, when I am listening to the DC-webcast and the lungs on its last day, in fact I am not even in the state of Guruyoga, so really very far from an experience of the deity concerned. Could it work then, that I receive it?

Of course you receive it - if you believe that you do. Again, faith, complete confidence in the Teacher, as the essence of all Buddhas, is what allows it to work. Being awake helps - have some coffee or gently pinch yourself. Sometimes I strongly rub the top of my head and this helps me stay awake.

And also I would like to ask, there are some mantras or dharanis in Sutric Buddhism like GATE-mantra and so on. Maybe, as they belong to Sutra and not Tantra, one does not need lung for these mantras?

My 2 cents is that if you say any mantra - even without a lung - it is better than common distracted speech. You can also test a mantra to see if it works. Do an accumulation of a mantra without lung and then do an accumulation of the same mantra having received the lung for that mantra. I think you will find that with a lung (perhaps because you will have more faith and confidence), it works better.

One of my root Teachers, the Venerable Deshung Rinpoche said mantras 24/7.

A practitioner of the great yidam Vajrakilaya was practicing on an island in a lake, and because of the power of his practice, the people on shore saw 5 colored lights coming from his simple hut, and he became a little famous. Then one day a high Lama, with his retinue, was passing by on the shore of that lake and decided that he should go and pay respects to the mantra Lama on the island. So they hired a boat and went out to the I sland. After exchanging pleasantries, the high Lama practiced a little with the mantra lama. Then the high Lama stopped the practice and said to the mantra Lama, "But you are saying it completely wrong, it is not chilli chilli ya but killi kila ya." They finished the practice and the high Lama and his retinue went back on their boats to go to the shore. But just as they got to the shore they turned and saw the mantra Lama walking over the water to them. The mantra lama was very respectful to the high Lama and said, "Excuse me Master, I am getting old, but was it kalli kila ya or killi kila ya?

So maybe everything does depend on faith - full confidence in the Buddhas.

So for me, if there is no conflict with whatever my Teacher, says or does, I get the blessings. Hmnnn? Maybe I can walk on water? Better to try from the shallows.

Hope this helps,

Long life to the Dzogchen Masters, with good health and with success in all things.

I wondered about the phrase you used to describe this thread until I remembered that it is possible to get drunk on dharma. At least for me it is.

Then I remembered a zen priest saying to me one time, "Zazen affects some people like alcohol." And even stranger, when that happens, the best way to sober up is to actually have some alcohol.

Puts a few things in perspective.

Dear all and All, more than you wanted to know about Zen and alcohol.

The analogy of "my mother drunk or sober", as used here, is not about being drunk on Dharma, nor is it just about a Teacher drinking beyond limits, and preserving normal mind, in spit of that. This analogy, to me, has a specific "action" usage which is:

If my mother were to come home at 4 am, barfing drunk, and too well partied, she is still my mother. Nothing she does can change that fact, and that I love her and have responsibility for her.

My job, (the action part) is to clean her up, put her to bed, and try to talk to her gently when she wakes up, that she should not do this again. It is bad for her health and very frightening for her children who love her- including me. The analogy as applied to a Teacher, is that if a Teacher acts badly (appears to be acting outside of the Dharma, convention, or common sense) then my job is to think of them like my mother acting badly, and not to stop having faith in them because of their apparent bad actions. Sometimes, If I am feeling very brave, I can try to gently intervene (stepping on the tail of the tiger?) and let the Teacher know that their actions are causing many students (who love them) to leave. Sometimes I (very sadly at the time) change Teachers.

The key point is that what a teacher does or does not do, (the example they set) is their business. What my Dharma brothers and sisters, do or don't do (the example they set), is their business. What I do, or don't do is my business. An example is sex. When I was growing up in the 60s, it was natural to smile at a woman and be in bed with her 10 minutes later. The worst of the downside was that you might have to step up to being a father. Now, in the age of aids it is different: like playing Russian roulette with a bullet that could take 10 years to arrive, and possibly becoming a father to an aids baby. Now there is only "safer" sex with an unknown partner. There is no safe sex unless you have a partner you trust.

Not to mention, trying to communicate "resting in the natural state" to a sperm and ovum when they are getting together. It can be done, but maybe not so easy. Reminds me of the porcupine joke. How do porcupines make love? Very, very carefully.

The key point is that understanding, accepting, and acting according to my limits,( hopefully with awareness), is appropriate for me, and what other people do, is up to them.

As regards Teachers and alcohol, one of my Teachers, Chakdud Rinpoche, was known to be able to drink a lot, and kept it up until his Doctors made him quit. Apparently he was not affected. Knowing my limits, I make a rule not to drink alcohol when I do not want my judgement to be impaired at all. I make a rule that if I am driving, I do not drink a drop. (One drop, for Ghana Puja, is OK.)

As regards being drunk as a poetic metaphor for enlightenment, I like this metaphor very much: works for me.

"An anthology of nearly 100 Chinese lyrics (san-ch'u) by 23 poets, three of them anonymous, all from the Yuan period (1271-1368). Seaton's colloquial English renderings are a sheer pleasure to read, so much so that the reader is apt to forget he is enjoying translations, until the occasional proper noun appears. All the lyrics chosen deal in one way or another with the rejection of worldly pursuits, and the majority recommend wine as one way, if not the way, to find relief from the tensions of life, hence the subtitle." -- Choice.

This thin book is my favorite give-away book - It's gone again and I will have to order another copy.

----(roughly from memory) "and we pound time on our plates, and bowls, until they break."

Sublime stories of the great Dzogchenpa Rumi. May Peace be upon Him and his family. See poem one: The Tavern - "Whomever Brought Me Here Will Have To Take Me Home."

Now it is story time.

It was long ago, etc.

One day a beautiful maiden was walking by the Temple and she made respects to the old high Lama who was sitting out front. The old Lama called the maiden, took her behind the Temple, and gave her a baby, then and there. When they had regained their composure, the now matron, asked the Lama, "Lamala you are supposed to be a high Lama, and beyond such things. Why are you behaving like an ordinary man?" The high Lama replied, "Oh don't be concerned. With my eye of wisdom I saw that you were going to be captured by an evil bandit tonight and he was going to give you a bad birth baby who would make trouble for you. So I thought that I should give you a good birth baby who will help you in your life."

I think that the moral of the story is supposed to be that we poor confused sufferers in Samsara, cannot judge the actions of a holy Lama when we don't know what is going on in their mind: maybe so - maybe not.